I like the beat, that was a good choice for the track. Hook is pretty good. Both rappers have decently good flow, but I'd say Twitch needs to sound a little less nasal and MM Catastrophe (which I assume is you?) could use a little work on his diction. A few of the words end up rolling over each other and makes it sound a little garbled at points. One advice I'd give (which may not be very useful since I only know of this being used for speeches and broadcasts, but I know it works for those so I assume it works for rapping) would be to sing while holding a pen in your mouth once or twice, then taking it out for actual recording - in theory it'd make it a lot smoother and remove the small enunciation messups, particularly in the outro.
I don't understand rap all that well, but this is what I can gather from a couple of quick listens. Hopefully it helps at all. I also don't particularly approve of the lyrical content (and Twitch's rhymes could be better written) but that's personal preference. Good luck in future tracks, if you post any more in steamgifts I'd be glad to check them out. :)
Thank you very much for the detailed feedback. It's hard to say as we're both from completely different areas, Twitch being from Michigan in the US and myself being from the UK, a lot of words in rap are shortened in order to flow quicker so I'm not sure if it's just this track that you may be not so inclined with the diction. It's not exactly the most intricate track, just something we did for a bit of fun. I do actually have 2 tapes already up on the channel so perhaps you can use those for comparison and tell me if the diction errors are present there too. :)
I've never heard of the pen method but I'll definitely take what you've said on board and extremely appreciated the detailed analysis so thank you very much. :)
The pen method is a fairly known trick for radio/tv broadcasters or people that need to speak in public often. I'm not entirely sure how it works but it really does clean up pronunciation and enunciation, but I'm also not entirely certain if it works for singing.
You don't sound like you're from the UK, I wouldn't have been able to guess if you hadn't told me, so I don't think accent goes into it. Might have been something just on that track because I listened to Forever and Psycho and your enunciation is a lot smoother on both of those tracks, although there are other things that I noticed. (By the way Psycho is a really good track, I love it, do you have download links for these tapes friend?)
I really don't know how to describe it, but ocasionally the way you (and Twitch has this issue as well) finish sentences seems... a little abrupt? It's odd but it feels like there's something missing in some lines. The only thing I can really do is tell you to listen to someone like Eminem or DMX and pay attention to the way they finish sentences off. Notice how almost every sentence ends in a strong syllable? That makes it so the time it takes to breathe in for the next line feels smoother with the beginning of the next verse. I believe you and Twitch were ending sentences in weak syllables and that was leaving small voids in the song - think of it as little disruptions of the flow, like small dips in a wavelength. You could probably notice it looking at the audio track too.
That brings me to my next point, while I found your lyrics in the two aforementioned tracks to be really good, it seems to me you would benefit from studying a little bit about poetic meter if you've never studied it before. Ocasionally you have lines that have more syllables than the one before which makes certain verses "clash" with each other. You can also see it visually by noticing if certain verses are physically longer than the previous ones. Smoothing that out also improves flow. Trying to make sure every verse has roughly (if not exactly) the same number of syllables is difficult, but greatly improves lyricism. You could couple that with using something like a trochee or the iambic pentameter to solve the issue of sentences ending in weak (unstressed) syllables. I think it's also important to time those with the beats and offbeats but that's getting into uncharted territory for me since I've studied poetry more than I've studied rapping.
Sounds like a lot when I put it like this but in reality I only saw it on a couple of verses so it's not a huge issue. Just small things that keep your flow from being perfect. I actually really enjoyed the other songs I listened to, going to check more out as soon as I can and I subscribed to your channel.
I also appreciate it that you take the criticism well, some people get upset so I tend to be reserved when doing something like this, but I think you understand I only mean it to be constructive. That's a really good attitude to have if you're serious about improving.
Pretty sure, they're available to download on my Soundcloud page. :)
I understand what you mean, once the EP drops, their are other tracks that I think you'll find we've corrected this. 2 especially.
I'm not a huge fan of Eminem to be honest, more into groups like Horseshoe G.A.N.G., LOX etc. I do like DMX though, my favourite rapper is actually Lloyd Banks who has a very unique flow. But I fully grasp what you're saying.
I'll definitely look into poetic meter, I'm always up for learning more, I've even read through multiple dictionaries as if they where novels.
Not at all, it's great having someone give detailed feedback. It's a rarity, trust me, so I really do appreciate it. :)
The track is better than I had expected.
I like the beat, that was a good choice for the track. Hook is pretty good. Both rappers have decently good flow, but I'd say Twitch needs to sound a little less nasal and MM Catastrophe (which I assume is you?) could use a little work on his diction. A few of the words end up rolling over each other and makes it sound a little garbled at points. One advice I'd give (which may not be very useful since I only know of this being used for speeches and broadcasts, but I know it works for those so I assume it works for rapping) would be to sing while holding a pen in your mouth once or twice, then taking it out for actual recording - in theory it'd make it a lot smoother and remove the small enunciation messups, particularly in the outro.
I don't understand rap all that well, but this is what I can gather from a couple of quick listens. Hopefully it helps at all. I also don't particularly approve of the lyrical content (and Twitch's rhymes could be better written) but that's personal preference. Good luck in future tracks, if you post any more in steamgifts I'd be glad to check them out. :)
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Thank you very much for the detailed feedback. It's hard to say as we're both from completely different areas, Twitch being from Michigan in the US and myself being from the UK, a lot of words in rap are shortened in order to flow quicker so I'm not sure if it's just this track that you may be not so inclined with the diction. It's not exactly the most intricate track, just something we did for a bit of fun. I do actually have 2 tapes already up on the channel so perhaps you can use those for comparison and tell me if the diction errors are present there too. :)
I've never heard of the pen method but I'll definitely take what you've said on board and extremely appreciated the detailed analysis so thank you very much. :)
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The pen method is a fairly known trick for radio/tv broadcasters or people that need to speak in public often. I'm not entirely sure how it works but it really does clean up pronunciation and enunciation, but I'm also not entirely certain if it works for singing.
You don't sound like you're from the UK, I wouldn't have been able to guess if you hadn't told me, so I don't think accent goes into it. Might have been something just on that track because I listened to Forever and Psycho and your enunciation is a lot smoother on both of those tracks, although there are other things that I noticed. (By the way Psycho is a really good track, I love it, do you have download links for these tapes friend?)
I really don't know how to describe it, but ocasionally the way you (and Twitch has this issue as well) finish sentences seems... a little abrupt? It's odd but it feels like there's something missing in some lines. The only thing I can really do is tell you to listen to someone like Eminem or DMX and pay attention to the way they finish sentences off. Notice how almost every sentence ends in a strong syllable? That makes it so the time it takes to breathe in for the next line feels smoother with the beginning of the next verse. I believe you and Twitch were ending sentences in weak syllables and that was leaving small voids in the song - think of it as little disruptions of the flow, like small dips in a wavelength. You could probably notice it looking at the audio track too.
That brings me to my next point, while I found your lyrics in the two aforementioned tracks to be really good, it seems to me you would benefit from studying a little bit about poetic meter if you've never studied it before. Ocasionally you have lines that have more syllables than the one before which makes certain verses "clash" with each other. You can also see it visually by noticing if certain verses are physically longer than the previous ones. Smoothing that out also improves flow. Trying to make sure every verse has roughly (if not exactly) the same number of syllables is difficult, but greatly improves lyricism. You could couple that with using something like a trochee or the iambic pentameter to solve the issue of sentences ending in weak (unstressed) syllables. I think it's also important to time those with the beats and offbeats but that's getting into uncharted territory for me since I've studied poetry more than I've studied rapping.
Sounds like a lot when I put it like this but in reality I only saw it on a couple of verses so it's not a huge issue. Just small things that keep your flow from being perfect. I actually really enjoyed the other songs I listened to, going to check more out as soon as I can and I subscribed to your channel.
I also appreciate it that you take the criticism well, some people get upset so I tend to be reserved when doing something like this, but I think you understand I only mean it to be constructive. That's a really good attitude to have if you're serious about improving.
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Pretty sure, they're available to download on my Soundcloud page. :)
I understand what you mean, once the EP drops, their are other tracks that I think you'll find we've corrected this. 2 especially.
I'm not a huge fan of Eminem to be honest, more into groups like Horseshoe G.A.N.G., LOX etc. I do like DMX though, my favourite rapper is actually Lloyd Banks who has a very unique flow. But I fully grasp what you're saying.
I'll definitely look into poetic meter, I'm always up for learning more, I've even read through multiple dictionaries as if they where novels.
Not at all, it's great having someone give detailed feedback. It's a rarity, trust me, so I really do appreciate it. :)
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Well, glad to be of help!
Looking forward to more content, if you ever wanna talk about music or poetry hit me up :)
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